English literature is the literature written in the English language, including

literature composed in English by writers not necessarily from

England; for example, Robert Burns was Scottish, James Joyce was Irish, Joseph C
onrad was born in Poland, Dylan Thomas was Welsh,
Edgar Allan Poe was American, V.S. Naipaul was born in Trinidad, and Vladimir Na
bokov was Russian, but all are considered important writers
in the history of English literature. In other words, English literature is as d
iverse as the varieties and dialects of English spoken around the
world. In academia, the term often labels departments and programmes practising
English studies in secondary and tertiary educational
systems. Despite the variety of authors of English literature, the works of Will
iam Shakespeare remain paramount throughout the
English-speaking world.
This article primarily deals with some of the literature from Britain written in
English. For literature from specific English-speaking regions,
consult the see also section, bottom of the page.
Contents
1 Old English
2 Middle English literature
3 Renaissance literature
4 Early Modern period
4.1 Elizabethan Era
4.2 Jacobean literature
4.3 Caroline and Cromwellian literature
4.4 Restoration literature
4.5 Augustan literature
5 18th century
6 Romanticism
7 Victorian literature
8 English literature since 1900
8.1 Modernism
8.2 Post-modern literature
8.3 Post World War II
9 See also
10 References
11 External links
[edit]Old English
Main article: Anglo-Saxon literature
The first works in English, written in Old English, appeared in the early Middle
Ages (the oldest surviving text is Cædmon's Hymn). The oral
tradition was very strong in the early English culture and most literary works
were written to be performed. Epic poems were thus very
popular and many, including Beowulf, have survived to the present day in the ric
h corpus of Anglo-Saxon literature that closely resemble
today's Icelandic, Norwegian, North Frisian and the Northumbrian and Scots Engli
sh dialects of modern English. Much Old English verse in the
extant manuscripts is probably a "milder" adaptation of the earlier Germanic war
poems from the continent. When such poetry was brought to
England it was still being handed down orally from one generation to another, a
nd the constant presence of alliterative verse, or .consonant
rhyme (today's newspaper headlines and marketing abundantly use this technique s
uch as in Big is Better) helped the Anglo-Saxon peoples
remember it. Such rhyme is a feature of Germanic languages and is opposed to vo
calic or end-rhyme of Romance languages. But the first
written literature dates to the early Christian monasteries founded by St. Augus
tine of Canterbury and his disciples and it is reasonable to
believe that it was somehow adapted to suit to needs of Christian readers.
[edit]Middle English literature
Main article: Middle English literature
In the 12th century, a new form of English now known as Middle English evolved.
This is the earliest form of English literature which is
comprehensible to modern readers and listeners, albeit not easily. Middle Englis
h lasts up until the 1470s, when the Chancery Standard, a form
of London-based English, became widespread and the printing press regularized t
he language. Middle English Bible translations, notably
Wyclif's Bible, helped to establish English as a literary language.

Geoffrey Chaucer
There are three main categories of Middle English Literature: Religious, Courtly
love, and Arthurian. William Langland's Piers Plowman is
considered by many critics to be one of the early great works of English literat
ure along with Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and Sir Gawain and
the Green Knight (most likely by the Pearl Poet) during the Middle Ages. It is a
lso the first allusion to a literary tradition of the legendary English
archer, swordsman, and outlaw Robin Hood.
The most significant Middle English author was Geoffrey Chaucer who was active i
n the late 14th century. Often regarded as the father of
English literature, Chaucer is widely credited as the first author to demonstrat
e the artistic legitimacy of the vernacular English language,
rather than French or Latin. The Canterbury Tales was Chaucer's magnum opus, and
a towering achievement of Western culture. The first
recorded association of Valentine's Day with romantic love is in Chaucer's Parle
ment of Foules 1382.[1]
The multilingual audience for literature in the 14th century can be illustrated
by the example of John Gower, who wrote in Latin, Middle English
and Anglo-Norman.
Among the many religious works are those in the Katherine Group and the writings
of Julian of Norwich and Richard Rolle.
Since at least the 14th century, poetry in English has been written in Ireland a
nd by Irish writers abroad. The earliest poem in English by a
Welsh poet dates from about 1470.
[edit]Renaissance literature
Main article: English Renaissance
Following the introduction of a printing press into England by William Caxton in
1476, vernacular literature flourished. The Reformation inspired
the production of vernacular liturgy which led to the Book of Common Prayer, a
lasting influence on literary English language. The poetry,
drama, and prose produced under both Queen Elizabeth I and King James I constit
ute what is today labelled as Early modern (or Renaissance).
[edit]Early Modern period
Further information: Early Modern English and Early Modern Britain
[edit]Elizabethan Era
Main article: Elizabethan literature
Further information: Canons of Renaissance poetry
The Elizabethan era saw a great flourishing of literature, especially in the fie
ld of drama. The Italian Renaissance had rediscovered the ancient
Greek and Roman theatre, and this was instrumental in the development of the new
drama, which was then beginning to evolve apart from the
old mystery and miracle plays of the Middle Ages. The Italians were particularl
y inspired by Seneca (a major tragic playwright and philosopher,
the tutor of Nero) and Plautus (its comic clichés, especially that of the boasting
soldier had a powerful influence on the Renaissance and after). However, the It
alian tragedies embraced a principle contrary to Seneca's ethics: showing blood
and violence on the stage. In Seneca's plays such scenes were only acted by the
characters. But the English playwrights were intrigued by Italian model: a consp
icuous community of Italian actors had settled in London and Giovanni Florio had
brought much of the Italian language and culture to England. It is also true th
at the Elizabethan Era was a very violent age and that the high incidence of pol
itical assassinations in Renaissance Italy (embodied by Niccolò Machiavelli's The
Prince) did little to calm fears of popish plots. As a result, representing that
kind of violence on the stage was probably more cathartic for the Elizabethan s
pectator. Following earlier Elizabethan plays such as Gorboduc by Sackville & No
rton and The Spanish Tragedy by Kyd that was to provide much material for Hamlet
, William Shakespeare stands out in this period as a poet and playwright as yet
unsurpassed. Shakespeare was not a man of
letters by profession, and probably had only some grammar school education. He
was neither a lawyer, nor an aristocrat as the "university
wits" that had monopolised the English stage when he started writing. But he wa
s very gifted and incredibly versatile, and he surpassed
"professionals" as Robert Greene who mocked this "shake-scene" of low origins.
Though most dramas met with great success, it is in his
later years (marked by the early reign of James I) that he wrote what have been
considered his greatest plays: Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet,
Othello, King Lear, Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra, and The Tempest, a tragicomed
y that inscribes within the main drama a brilliant pageant to
the new king. Shakespeare also popularized the English sonnet which made signif
icant changes to Petrarch's model.
The sonnet was introduced into English by Thomas Wyatt in the early 16th century
. Poems intended to be set to music as songs, such as by
Thomas Campion, became popular as printed literature was disseminated more widel
y in households. See English Madrigal School. Other
important figures in Elizabethan theatre include Christopher Marlowe, Thomas De
kker, John Fletcher and Francis Beaumont. Had Marlowe
(1564 1593) not been stabbed at twenty-nine in a tavern brawl, says Anthony Burge
ss, he might have rivalled, if not equalled Shakespeare
himself for his poetic gifts. Remarkably, he was born only a few weeks before Sh
akespeare and must have known him well. Marlowe's subject
matter, though, is different: it focuses more on the moral drama of the renaiss
ance man than any other thing. Marlowe was fascinated and
terrified by the new frontiers opened by modern science. Drawing on German lore,
he introduced Dr. Faustus to England, a scientist and
magician who is obsessed by the thirst of knowledge and the desire to push man's
technological power to its limits. He acquires supernatural
gifts that even allow him to go back in time and wed Helen of Troy, but at the e
nd of his twenty-four years' covenant with the devil he has to
surrender his soul to him. His dark heroes may have something of Marlowe himself
, whose death remains a mystery. He was known for being
an atheist, leading a lawless life, keeping many mistresses, consorting with ruf
fians: living the 'high life' of London's underworld. But many
suspect that this might have been a cover-up for his activities as a secret agen
t for Elizabeth I, hinting that the 'accidental stabbing' might have
been a premeditated assassination by the enemies of The Crown. Beaumont and Flet
cher are less-known, but it is almost sure that they helped Shakespeare write so
me of his best dramas, and were quite popular at the time. It is also at this ti
me that the city comedy genre develops. In the later 16th century English poetry
was characterised by elaboration of language and extensive allusion to classica
l myths. The most important poets of this era include Edmund Spenser and Sir Phi
lip Sidney. Elizabeth herself, a product of Renaissance humanism, produced occas
ional poems such as On Monsieur s Departure.
[edit]Jacobean literature
After Shakespeare's death, the poet and dramatist Ben Jonson was the leading lit
erary figure of the Jacobean era (The reign of James I).
However, Jonson's aesthetics hark back to the Middle Ages rather than to the Tud
or Era: his characters embody the theory of humours.
According to this contemporary medical theory, behavioral differences result fro
m a prevalence of one of the body's four "humours"
(blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile) over the other three; these humours
correspond with the four elements of the universe: air, water,
fire, and earth. This leads Jonson to exemplify such differences to the point o
f creating types, or clichés.
Jonson is a master of style, and a brilliant satirist. His Volpone shows how a g
roup of scammers are fooled by a top con-artist, vice being
punished by vice, virtue meting out its reward.
Others who followed Jonson's style include Beaumont and Fletcher, who wrote the
brilliant comedy, The Knight of the Burning Pestle, a
mockery of the rising middle class and especially of those nouveaux riches who
pretend to dictate literary taste without knowing much
literature at all. In the story, a couple of grocers wrangle with professional a
ctors to have their illiterate son play a leading role in a drama. He
becomes a knight-errant wearing, appropriately, a burning pestle on his shield.
Seeking to win a princess' heart, the young man is ridiculed
much in the way Don Quixote was. One of Beaumont and Fletcher's chief merits was
that of realising how feudalism and chivalry had turned
into snobbery and make-believe and that new social classes were on the rise.
Another popular style of theatre during Jacobean times was the revenge play, pop
ularized by John Webster and Thomas Kyd.
George Chapman wrote a couple of subtle revenge tragedies, but must be remembere
d chiefly on account of his famous translation of Homer,
one that had a profound influence on all future English literature, even inspiri
ng John Keats to write one of his best sonnets.
The King James Bible, one of the most massive translation projects in the histor
y of English up to this time, was started in 1604 and completed
in 1611. It represents the culmination of a tradition of Bible translation into
English that began with the work of William Tyndale. It became the
standard Bible of the Church of England, and some consider it one of the greate
st literary works of all time. This project was headed by James
I himself, who supervised the work of forty-seven scholars. Although many other
translations into English have been made, some of which are
widely considered more accurate, many aesthetically prefer the King James Bible,
whose meter is made to mimic the original Hebrew verse.
Besides Shakespeare, whose figure towers over the early 17th century, the major
poets of the early 17th century included John Donne and the
other Metaphysical poets. Influenced by continental Baroque, and taking as his
subject matter both Christian mysticism and eroticism,
metaphysical poetry uses unconventional or "unpoetic" figures, such as a compass
or a mosquito, to reach surprise effects. For example,
in "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning", one of Donne's Songs and Sonnets, the p
oints of a compass represent two lovers, the woman who is
home, waiting, being the centre, the farther point being her lover sailing away
from her. But the larger the distance, the more the hands of the
compass lean to each other: separation makes love grow fonder. The paradox or t
he oxymoron is a constant in this poetry whose fears and
anxieties also speak of a world of spiritual certainties shaken by the modern di
scoveries of geography and science, one that is no longer the
centre of the universe. Apart from the metaphysical poetry of Donne, the 17th c
entury is also celebrated for its Baroque poetry. Baroque
 poetry served the same ends as the art of the period; the Baroque style is loft
y, sweeping, epic, and religious. Many of these poets have an
overtly Catholic sensibility (namely Richard Crashaw) and wrote poetry for the
Catholic counter-Reformation in order to establish a feeling of
supremacy and mysticism that would ideally persuade newly emerging Protestant g
roups back toward Catholicism.
[edit]Caroline and Cromwellian literature
The turbulent years of the mid-17th century, during the reign of Charles I and t
he subsequent Commonwealth and Protectorate, saw a
flourishing of political literature in English. Pamphlets written by sympathiser
s of every faction in the English civil war ran from vicious
personal attacks and polemics, through many forms of propaganda, to high-minded
schemes to reform the nation. Of the latter type,
Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes would prove to be one of the most important works of
British political philosophy. Hobbes's writings are some
of the few political works from the era which are still regularly published whi
le John Bramhall, who was Hobbes's chief critic, is largely
forgotten. The period also saw a flourishing of news books, the precursors to th
e British newspaper, with journalists such as Henry Muddiman,
Marchamont Needham, and John Birkenhead representing the views and activities o
f the contending parties. The frequent arrests of authors
and the suppression of their works, with the consequence of foreign or undergrou
nd printing, led to the proposal of a licensing system. The
Areopagitica, a political pamphlet by John Milton, was written in opposition to
licensing and is regarded as one of the most eloquent defenses
of press freedom ever written.
Specifically in the reign of Charles I (1625 42), English Renaissance theatre ex
perienced its concluding efflorescence. The last works of
Ben Jonson appeared on stage and in print, along with the final generation of ma
jor voices in the drama of the age: John Ford, Philip Massinger,
James Shirley, and Richard Brome. With the closure of the theatres at the start
of the English Civil War in 1642, drama was suppressed for a
generation, to resume only in the altered society of the English Restoration in
1660.

Samuel Pepys, took the diary beyond mere business transaction notes, into the re
alm of the personal
Diarists John Evelyn and Samuel Pepys depicted everyday London life and the cult
ural scene of the times. Their works are among the most
important primary sources for the English Restoration period, and consists of e
yewitness accounts of many great events, such as the
Great Plague of London, and the Great Fire of London.
Other forms of literature written during this period are usually ascribed politi
cal subtexts, or their authors are grouped along political lines.
The cavalier poets, active mainly before the civil war, owed much to the earlier
school of metaphysical poets. The forced retirement of royalist
officials after the execution of Charles I was a good thing in the case of Izaak
Walton, as it gave him time to work on his book The Compleat
Angler. Published in 1653, the book, ostensibly a guide to fishing, is much mor
e: a meditation on life, leisure, and contentment. The two most
important poets of Oliver Cromwell's England were Andrew Marvell and John Milto
n, with both producing works praising the new government;
such as Marvell's An Horatian Ode upon Cromwell's Return from Ireland. Despite
their republican beliefs they escaped punishment upon the
Restoration of Charles II, after which Milton wrote some of his greatest poetic
al works (with any possible political message hidden under allego
ry). Thomas Browne was another writer of the period; a learned man with an exten
sive library, he wrote prolifically on science, religion,
medicine and the esoteric.
[edit]Restoration literature
Main article: Restoration Literature
John Milton, religious epic poem Paradise Lost published in 1667.
Restoration literature includes both Paradise Lost and the Earl of Rochester's S
odom, the high spirited sexual comedy of The Country Wife
and the moral wisdom of Pilgrim's Progress. It saw Locke's Two Treatises on Gov
ernment, the founding of the Royal Society, the experiments
of Robert Boyle and the holy meditations of Boyle, the hysterical attacks on th
eatres from Jeremy Collier, the pioneering of literary criticism
from Dryden, and the first newspapers. The official break in literary culture ca
used by censorship and radically moralist standards under
Cromwell's Puritan regime created a gap in literary tradition, allowing a seemi
ngly fresh start for all forms of literature after the Restoration.
During the Interregnum, the royalist forces attached to the court of Charles I w
ent into exile with the twenty-year-old Charles II. The nobility who
travelled with Charles II were therefore lodged for over a decade in the midst o
f the continent's literary scene. Charles spent his time attending
plays in France, and he developed a taste for Spanish plays. Those nobles livin
g in Holland began to learn about mercantile exchange as well
as the tolerant, rationalist prose debates that circulated in that officially to
lerant nation.
The largest and most important poetic form of the era was satire. In general, pu
blication of satire was done anonymously. There were great
dangers in being associated with a satire. On the one hand, defamation law was a
wide net, and it was difficult for a satirist to avoid prosecution
if he were proven to have written a piece that seemed to criticize a noble. On
the other hand, wealthy individuals would respond to satire as
often as not by having the suspected poet physically attacked by ruffians. John
Dryden was set upon for being merely suspected of having
written the Satire on Mankind. A consequence of this anonymity is that a great
many poems, some of them of merit, are unpublished and
largely unknown.
Prose in the Restoration period is dominated by Christian religious writing, but
the Restoration also saw the beginnings of two genres that
would dominate later periods: fiction and journalism. Religious writing often st
rayed into political and economic writing, just as political and
economic writing implied or directly addressed religion. The Restoration was als
o the time when John Locke wrote many of his philosophical
works. Locke's empiricism was an attempt at understanding the basis of human und
erstanding itself and thereby devising a proper manner for making sound decision
s. These same scientific methods led Locke to his three Treatises on Government,
which later inspired the thinkers in the American Revolution. As with his work
on understanding, Locke moves from the most basic units of society toward the mo
re elaborate, and, like Thomas Hobbes, he emphasizes the plastic nature of the s
ocial contract. For an age that had seen absolute monarchy overthrown, democracy
attempted, democracy corrupted, and limited monarchy restored, only a flexible
basis for government could be satisfying. The Restoration moderated most of the
more strident sectarian writing, but radicalism persisted after the Restoration.
Puritan authors such as John Milton were forced to retire from public life or a
dapt, and those Digger, Fifth Monarchist, Leveller, Quaker, and Anabaptist autho
rs who had preached against monarchy and who had participated directly in the re
gicide of Charles I were partially suppressed. Consequently, violent writings we
re forced underground, and many of those who
had served in the Interregnum attenuated their positions in the Restoration. Jo
hn Bunyan stands out beyond other religious authors of the
period. Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress is an allegory of personal salvation an
d a guide to the Christian life. Instead of any focus on
eschatology or divine retribution, Bunyan instead writes about how the individua
l saint can prevail against the temptations of mind and body
that threaten damnation. The book is written in a straightforward narrative and
shows influence from both drama and biography, and yet it also
shows an awareness of the grand allegorical tradition found in Edmund Spenser.
During the Restoration period, the most common manner of
getting news would have been a broadsheet publication. A single, large sheet of
paper might have a written, usually partisan, account of an
event. However, the period saw the beginnings of the first professional and peri
odical (meaning that the publication was regular) journalism in
England. Journalism develops late, generally around the time of William of Oran
ge's claiming the throne in 1689. Coincidentally or by design,
England began to have newspapers just when William came to court from Amsterdam,
where there were already newspapers being published.
It is impossible to satisfactorily date the beginning of the novel in English. H
owever, long fiction and fictional biographies began to distinguish
themselves from other forms in England during the Restoration period. An existi
ng tradition of Romance fiction in France and Spain was
popular in England. The "Romance" was considered a feminine form, and women wer
e taxed with reading "novels" as a vice. One of the most
significant figures in the rise of the novel in the Restoration period is Aphra
Behn. She was not only the first professional female novelist, but
she may be among the first professional novelists of either sex in England. Beh
n's most famous novel was Oroonoko in 1688. This was a
biography of an entirely fictional African king who had been enslaved in Surinam
e. Behn's novels show the influence of tragedy and her
experiences as a dramatist.
As soon as the previous Puritan regime's ban on public stage representations was
lifted, the drama recreated itself quickly and abundantly.
The most famous plays of the early Restoration period are the unsentimental or "
hard" comedies of John Dryden, William Wycherley, and
George Etherege, which reflect the atmosphere at Court, and celebrate an aristoc
ratic macho lifestyle of unremitting sexual intrigue and
conquest. After a sharp drop in both quality and quantity in the 1680s, the mid-
90s saw a brief second flowering of the drama, especially
comedy. Comedies like William Congreve's The Way of the World (1700), and John V
anbrugh's The Relapse (1696) and The Provoked Wife
(1697) were "softer" and more middle-class in ethos, very different from the ari
stocratic extravaganza twenty years earlier, and aimed at a
wider audience. The playwrights of the 1690s set out to appeal to more socially
mixed audiences with a strong middle-class element, and
to female spectators, for instance by moving the war between the sexes from the
arena of intrigue into that of marriage. The focus in comedy
is less on young lovers outwitting the older generation, more on marital relatio
ns after the wedding bells.
[edit]Augustan literature
Main article: Augustan literature
The term Augustan literature derives from authors of the 1720s and 1730s themsel
ves, who responded to a term that George I of England
preferred for himself. While George I meant the title to reflect his might, the
y instead saw in it a reflection of Ancient Rome's transition from
rough and ready literature to highly political and highly polished literature. B
ecause of the aptness of the metaphor, the period from 1689 - 1750
was called "the Augustan Age" by critics throughout the 18th century (including
Voltaire and Oliver Goldsmith). The literature of the period is
overtly political and thoroughly aware of critical dictates for literature. It i
s an age of exuberance and scandal, of enormous energy and
 inventiveness and outrage, that reflected an era when English, Scottish, and Ir
ish people found themselves in the midst of an expanding
economy, lowering barriers to education, and the stirrings of the Industrial Rev
olution.
The most outstanding poet of the age is Alexander Pope, but Pope's excellence is
partially in his constant battle with other poets, and his
serene, seemingly neo-Classical approach to poetry is in competition with highly
idiosyncratic verse and strong competition from such poets
as Ambrose Philips. It was during this time that James Thomson produced his mela
ncholy The Seasons and Edward Young wrote
Night Thoughts. It is also the era that saw a serious competition over the prop
er model for the pastoral. In criticism, poets struggled with
a doctrine of decorum, of matching proper words with proper sense and of achievi
ng a diction that matched the gravity of a subject. At the
same time, the mock-heroic was at its zenith. Pope's Rape of the Lock and The Du
nciad are still the greatest mock-heroic poems ever written.
In prose, the earlier part of the period was overshadowed by the development of
the English essay. Joseph Addison and
Richard Steele's The Spectator established the form of the British periodical e
ssay, inventing the pose of the detached observer of human life
who can meditate upon the world without advocating any specific changes in it.
However, this was also the time when the English novel, first
emerging in the Restoration, developed into a major art form. Daniel Defoe turne
d from journalism and writing criminal lives for the press to
writing fictional criminal lives with Roxana and Moll Flanders. He also wrote a
fictional treatment of the travels of Alexander Selkirk called
Robinson Crusoe (1719). The novel would benefit indirectly from a tragedy of the
stage, and in mid-century many more authors would begin
to write novels.

Jonathan Swift
If Addison and Steele overawed one type of prose, then Jonathan Swift did anothe
r. Swift's prose style is unmannered and direct, with a clarity
that few contemporaries matched. He was a profound skeptic about the modern wor
ld, but he was similarly profoundly distrustful of nostalgia. He saw in history
a record of lies and vanity, and he saw in the present a madness of vanity and l
ies. Core Christian values were essential, but these values had to be muscular a
nd assertive and developed by constant rejection of the games of confidence men
and their gullies. Swift's A Tale of a Tub announced his skeptical analysis of t
he claims of the modern world, and his later prose works, such as his war with P
atridge the astrologer, and most of all his derision of pride in Gulliver's Trav
els left only the individual in constant fear and humility safe. After his "exil
e" to Ireland, Swift reluctantly began defending the Irish people from the preda
tions of colonialism. His A Modest Proposal and the Drapier Letters provoked rio
ts and arrests, but Swift, who had no love of Irish Roman Catholics, was outrage
d by the abuses and barbarity he saw around him.
Drama in the early part of the period featured the last plays of John Vanbrugh a
nd William Congreve, both of whom carried on the Restoration
comedy with some alterations. However, the majority of stagings were of lower fa
rces and much more serious and domestic tragedies. George
Lillo and Richard Steele both produced highly moral forms of tragedy, where the
characters and the concerns of the characters were wholly
middle class or working class. This reflected a marked change in the audience f
or plays, as royal patronage was no longer the important part
of theatrical success. Additionally, Colley Cibber and John Rich began to battl
e each other for greater and greater spectacles to present on
stage. The figure of Harlequin was introduced, and pantomime theatre began to b
e staged. This "low" comedy was quite popular, and the plays
became tertiary to the staging. Opera also began to be popular in London, and t
here was significant literary resistance to this Italian incursion.
This trend was broken only by a few attempts at a new type of comedy. Pope and
John Arbuthnot and John Gay attempted a play entitled
Three Hours After Marriage that failed. In 1728, however, John Gay returned to t
he playhouse with The Beggar's Opera. Gay's opera was in
English and retold the story of Jack Sheppard and Jonathan Wild. However, it se
emed to be an allegory for Robert Walpole and the directors
of the South Sea Company, and so Gay's follow up opera was banned without perfor
mance. The Licensing Act 1737 brought an abrupt halt to
much of the period's drama, as the theatres were once again brought under state
control.
An effect of the Licensing Act was to cause more than one aspiring playwright to
switch over to writing novels. Henry Fielding began to write
prose satire and novels after his plays could not pass the censors. Henry Brook
e also turned to novels. In the interim, Samuel Richardson had
produced a novel intended to counter the deleterious effects of novels in Pamel
a, or Virtue Rewarded (1740). Henry Fielding attacked the
absurdity of this novel with two of his own works, Joseph Andrews and Shamela,
and then countered Richardson's Clarissa with Tom Jones.
Henry Mackenzie wrote The Man of Feeling and indirectly began the sentimental n
ovel. Laurence Sterne attempted a Swiftian novel with a
unique perspective on the impossibility of biography (the model for most novels
up to that point) and understanding with Tristram Shandy,
even as his detractor Tobias Smollett elevated the picaresque novel with his wor
ks. Each of these novels represents a formal and thematic
divergence from the others. Each novelist was in dialogue and competition with t
he others, and, in a sense, the novel established itself as a
diverse and open-formed genre in this explosion of creativity. The most lasting
effects of the experimentation would be the psychological
realism of Richardson, the bemused narrative voice of Fielding, and the sentimen
tality of Brooke.
[edit]18th century
Further information: 18th century literature
During the Age of Sensibility, literature reflected the worldview of the Age of
Enlightenment (or Age of Reason) a rational and scientific
approach to religious, social, political, and economic issues that promoted a se
cular view of the world and a general sense of progress and
perfectibility. Led by the philosophers who were inspired by the discoveries of
the previous century (Newton) and the writings of Descartes,
Locke and Bacon.
They sought to discover and to act upon universally valid principles governing h
umanity, nature, and society. They variously attacked spiritual
and scientific authority, dogmatism, intolerance, censorship, and economic and
social restraints. They considered the state the proper and
rational instrument of progress. The extreme rationalism and skepticism of the a
ge led naturally to deism; the same qualities played a part in
bringing the later reaction of romanticism. The Encyclopédie of Denis Diderot epi
tomized the spirit of the age.
During the end of the 18th century, Horace Walpole's 1764 novel The Castle of Ot
ranto, created the Gothic fiction genre, that combines
elements of horror and romance. The pioneering gothic novelist Ann Radcliffe int
roduced the brooding figure of the gothic villain which
developed into the Byronic hero. Her most popular and influential work The Myste
ries of Udolpho 1794, is frequently cited as the archetypal
Gothic novel. Vathek 1786 by William Beckford, and The Monk 1796 by Matthew Lewi
s, were further notable early works in both the gothic and
horror literary genres.
[edit]Romanticism
William Blake is considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry a
nd visual arts of the Romantic Age
The changing landscape of Britain brought about by the steam engine has two majo
r outcomes: the boom of industrialism with the expansion
of the city, and the consequent depopulation of the countryside as a result of t
he enclosures, or privatisation of pastures. Most peasants
poured into the city to work in the new factories.
This abrupt change is revealed by the change of meaning in five key words: indus
try (once meaning "creativity"), democracy (once
disparagingly used as "mob rule"), class (from now also used with a social conno
tation), art (once just meaning "craft"), culture (once only
belonging to farming).
But the poor condition of workers, the new class-conflicts and the pollution of
the environment causes a reaction to urbanism and
industrialisation prompting poets to rediscover the beauty and value of nature.
Mother earth is seen as the only source of wisdom, the only
solution to the ugliness caused by machines.
The superiority of nature and instinct over civilisation had been preached by Je
an Jacques Rousseau and his message was picked by almost
all European poets. The first in England were the Lake Poets, a small group of f
riends including William Wordsworth and
Samuel Taylor Coleridge. These early Romantic Poets brought a new emotionalism
and introspection, and their emergence is marked by the
first romantic Manifesto in English literature, the "Preface to the Lyrical Bal
lads". This collection was mostly contributed by Wordsworth,
although Coleridge must be credited for his long and impressive Rime of the Anc
ient Mariner, a tragic ballad about the survival of one sailor
through a series of supernatural events on his voyage through the south seas wh
ich involves the slaying of an albatross, the death of the rest
of the crew, a visit from Death and his mate, Life-in-Death, and the eventual r
edemption of the Mariner.
Coleridge and Wordsworth, however, understood romanticism in two entirely differ
ent ways: while Coleridge sought to make the supernatural "
real" (much like sci-fi movies use special effects to make unlikely plots believ
able), Wordsworth sought to stir the imagination of readers
through his down-to-earth characters taken from real life (in "The Idiot Boy",
for example), or the beauty of the Lake District that largely
inspired his production (as in "Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey")
.

Lord Byron
The "Second generation" of Romantic poets includes Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shel
ley and John Keats. Byron, however, was still influenced
by 18th-century satirists and was, perhaps the least 'romantic' of the three. H
is amours with a number of prominent but married ladies was
also a way to voice his dissent on the hypocrisy of a high society that was only
apparently religious but in fact largely libertine, the same that
had derided him for being physically impaired. His first trip to Europe resulte
d in the first two cantos of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, a
mock-heroic epic of a young man's adventures in Europe but also a sharp satire a
gainst London society. Despite Childe Harold's success on
his return to England, accompanied by the publication of The Corsair his alleged
incestuous affair with his half-sister Augusta Leigh in 1816
actually forced him to leave England for good and seek asylum on the continent.
Here he joined Percy Bysshe Shelley, his wife Mary, with his
secretary John William Polidori on the shores of Lake Geneva during the 'year wi
thout a summer' of 1816. Polidori's The Vampyre was
published in 1819, creating the literary vampire genre. His short story was insp
ired by the life of Lord Byron and his poem The Giaour.
One of Percy Shelley's most prominent works is the Ode to the West Wind. Despite
his apparent refusal to believe in God, this poem is
considered a homage to pantheism, the recognition of a spiritual presence in nat
ure. Shelley's groundbreaking poem The Masque of Anarchy
calls for nonviolence in protest and political action. It is perhaps the first m
odern statement of the principle of nonviolent protest.[2]
Mahatma Gandhi's passive resistance was influenced and inspired by Shelley's ve
rse, and Gandhi would often quote the poem to vast
audiences.[3]

Mary Shelley
The plot for Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is said to have come from a nightmare s
he had during stormy nights on Lake Geneva in the company
of Percy Shelley, Lord Byron, and John Polidori. Her idea of making a body with
human parts stolen from different corpses and then animating
it with electricity was perhaps influenced by Alessandro Volta's invention and
Luigi Galvani's experiments with dead frogs. Frankenstein's
chilling tale also suggests modern organ transplants, tissue regeneration, remi
nding us of the moral issues raised by today's medicine. But
the creature of Frankenstein is incredibly romantic as well. Although "the monst
er" is intelligent, good and loving, he is shunned by everyone
because of his ugliness and deformity, and the desperation and envy that result
from social exclusion turn him against the very man who
created him.
John Keats did not share Byron's and Shelley's extremely revolutionary ideals, b
ut his cult of pantheism is as important as Shelley's. Keats
was in love with the ancient stones of the Parthenon that Lord Elgin had brought
to England from Greece, also known as the Elgin Marbles).
He celebrates ancient Greece: the beauty of free, youthful love couples here wit
h that of classical art. Keats's great attention to art, especially
in his Ode on a Grecian Urn is quite new in romanticism, and it inspired Walter
Pater's and then Oscar Wilde's belief in the absolute value of art
as independent from aesthetics.
Some rightly think that the most popular novelist of the era was Sir Walter Scot
t, whose grand historical romances inspired a generation of
painters, composers, and writers throughout Europe. Scott's novel-writing career
was launched in 1814 with Waverley, often called the first
historical novel, and was followed by Ivanhoe. His popularity in England and fu
rther abroad did much to form the modern stereotype of
Scottish culture. Other novels by Scott which contributed to the image of him a
s a Scottish patriot include Rob Roy.
In retrospect, we now look back to Jane Austen, who wrote novels about the life
of the landed gentry, seen from a woman's point of view,
and wryly focused on practical social issues, especially marriage and choosing t
he right partner in life, with love being above all else.
Austen's Pride and Prejudice would set the model for all Romance Novels to follo
w. Jane Austen created the ultimate hero and heroine in
Darcy and Elizabeth, who must overcome their own stubborn pride and the prejudic
es they have toward each other, in order to come to a
middle ground, where they finally realize their love for one another. Austen's o
ther most notable works include; Sense and Sensibility,
Mansfield Park, Persuasion and Emma. In her novels, Austen brings to light the h
ardships women faced, who usually did not inherit money,
could not work and where their only chance in life depended on the man they marr
ied. She brought to light not only the difficulties women
faced in her day, but also what was expected of men and of the careers they had
 to follow. This she does with wit and humour and with
endings where all characters, good or bad, receive exactly what they deserve. Po
et, painter and printmaker William Blake is usually included
among the English Romanticists, though his visionary work is much different from
that of the others discussed in this section.
In America, with the essays and poetry of Ralph Waldo Emerson began an explosion
of American English literature, which included the
publication of Herman Melville's Moby Dick and the poetry of Walt Whitman and Em
ily Dickinson.
[edit]Victorian literature
Main article: Victorian literature

Charles Dickens
It was in the Victorian era (1837 1901) that the novel became the leading form of
literature in English. Most writers were now more concerned
to meet the tastes of a large middle class reading public than to please aristo
cratic patrons. The best known works of the era include the
emotionally powerful works of the Brontë sisters; the satire Vanity Fair by Willia
m Makepeace Thackeray; the realist novels of George Eliot;
and Anthony Trollope's insightful portrayals of the lives of the landowning and
professional classes.
Charles Dickens emerged on the literary scene in the 1830s, confirming the trend
for serial publication. Dickens wrote vividly about London
life and the struggles of the poor, but in a good-humoured fashion which was ac
ceptable to readers of all classes. His early works such as the
Pickwick Papers are masterpieces of comedy. Later his works became darker, with
out losing his genius for caricature.
The Bronte sisters were English writers of the 1840s and 1850s. Their novels cau
sed a sensation when they were first published and were
subsequently accepted into the canon of great English literature. They had writt
en compulsively from early childhood and were first published,
at their own expense, in 1846 as poets under the pseudonyms Currer, Ellis and A
cton Bell. The book attracted little attention, selling only two
copies. The sisters returned to prose, producing a novel each in the following y
ear. Charlotte's Jane Eyre, Emily's Wuthering Heights and
Anne's Agnes Grey were released in 1847.
An interest in rural matters and the changing social and economic situation of t
he countryside may be seen in the novels of Thomas Hardy,
Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell, and others. Leading poetic figures included Alfred T
ennyson, Robert Browning, Elizabeth Barrett Browning,
Matthew Arnold, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and Christina Rossetti.
The novels of George Eliot, such as Middlemarch, were a milestone of literary re
alism, and combine high Victorian literary detail with an
intellectual breadth that removes them from the narrow confines they often depic
t. Novels of Thomas Hardy and others, dealt with the
changing social and economic situation of the countryside. Wilkie Collins episto
lary novel The Moonstone 1868, has been acclaimed as the
first detective novel in the English language.[4]
The premier ghost story writer of the 19th century was Sheridan Le Fanu. His wor
ks include the macabre mystery novel Uncle Silas 1865, and
his Gothic novella Carmilla 1872, tells the story of a young woman's susceptibi
lity to the attentions of a female vampire. Bram Stoker's seminal
horror Dracula, has been attributed to a number of literary genres including va
mpire literature, horror fiction, gothic novel and invasion
literature.
H. G. Wells
H. G. Wells invented a number of themes that are now classic in the science fict
ion genre. The War of the Worlds 1898, describing an
invasion of late Victorian England by Martians using tripod fighting machines eq
uipped with advanced weaponry, is a seminal depiction of an
alien invasion of Earth. The Time Machine is generally credited with the popular
ization of the concept of time travel using a vehicle that allows
an operator to travel purposefully and selectively. The term "time machine" coin
ed by Wells, is now universally used to refer to such a vehicle.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was born in Scotland of Irish parents but his Sherlock Ho
lmes stories have typified a fog-filled London for readers
worldwide
Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes is a brilliant London-based "consulting det
ective", famous for his intellectual prowess. Conan Doyle
wrote four novels and fifty-six short stories featuring Holmes, from 1880 up to
1907, with a final case in 1914. All but four Conan Doyle stories
are narrated by Holmes' friend, assistant, and biographer, Dr. John H. Watson.
Literature for children developed as a separate genre. Some works become globall
y well-known, such as those of Lewis Carroll and
Edward Lear, both of whom used nonsense verse. Adventure novels, such as those o
f Robert Louis Stevenson, are generally classified as for
children. Stevenson's Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, depicts the dual p
ersonality of a kind and intelligent physician who turns into a
psychopathic monster after imbibing a drug intended to separate good from evil i
n a personality. His Kidnapped is a fast-paced historical novel
set in the aftermath of the '45 Jacobite Rising, and Treasure Island 1883, is t
he classic pirate adventure. At the end of the Victorian Era and lead
ing into the Edwardian Era, Beatrix Potter was an author and illustrator, best k
nown for her children s books, which featured animal characters.
In her thirties, Potter published the highly successful children's book The Tale
of Peter Rabbit in 1902. Potter eventually went on to published 23
children's books and become a wealthly woman. Her books along with Lewis Carrol
l s are read and published to this day.
The Lost World literary genre was inspired by real stories of archaeological dis
coveries by imperial adventurers. H. Rider Haggard wrote one of
the earliest examples, King Solomon's Mines in 1885. Contemporary European polit
ics and diplomatic manoeuvrings informed Anthony Hope's
swashbuckling Ruritanian adventure novels The Prisoner of Zenda. An important fo
rerunner of modernist literature, Joseph Conrad wrote the
novel Heart of Darkness in 1899. A symbolic story within a story or frame narrat
ive about an Englishman Marlow's foreign assignment, it is wide
ature and part of the Western canon.
[edit]English literature since 1900
Rudyard Kipling
The major lyric poet of the first decades of the 20th century was Thomas Hardy.
Following the classic novels Tess of the d'Urbervilles and
Far from the Madding Crowd, Hardy then concentrated on poetry after the harsh r
esponse to his last novel, Jude the Obscure. The most
widely popular writer of the early years of the 20th century was arguably Rudyar
d Kipling, a highly versatile writer of novels, short stories and
poems. To date the youngest ever recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature, Ki
pling's novels include The Jungle Book, The Man Who Would
Be King and Kim, while his inspirational poem If is a national favourite. Like Wi
lliam Ernest Henley's poem Invictus that has inspired such
people as Nelson Mandela when he was incarcerated,[5] If is a memorable evocation
of Victorian stoicism, regarded as a traditional British
 virtue. Erskine Childers' The Riddle of the Sands 1903, defined the spy novel.
The Kailyard school of Scottish writers presented an idealised
version of society and brought elements of fantasy and folklore back into fashio
n, notably J. M. Barrie, creator of Peter Pan. The 1905 novel The
Scarlet Pimpernel by Emma Orczy, is a precursor to the "disguised superhero". In
1908, Kenneth Grahame wrote the children's classic
The Wind in the Willows, while the Scouts founder Robert Baden Powell's first bo
ok Scouting for Boys was published. John Buchan penned
the adventure novel The Thirty-Nine Steps in 1915. Strongly influenced by his Ch
ristian faith, G. K. Chesterton was a prolific and hugely
influential writer with a diverse output. Aldous Huxley's futuristic novel Brav
e New World, anticipates developments in reproductive technology
and sleep-learning that combine to change society. The future society is an emb
odiment of the ideals that form the basis of futurism.
[edit]Modernism
Main article: Modernist literature
The movement known as English literary modernism grew out of a general sense of
disillusionment with Victorian era attitudes of certainty,
conservatism, and objective truth. The movement was greatly influenced by the id
eas of Romanticism, Karl Marx's political writings, and the
psychoanalytic theories of subconscious - Sigmund Freud. The continental art mov
ements of Impressionism, and later Cubism, were also
important inspirations for modernist writers.

James Joyce, 1918

Although literary modernism reached its peak between the First and Second World
Wars, the earliest examples of the movement's attitudes
appeared in the mid to late 19th century. Gerard Manley Hopkins, A. E. Housman,
and the poet and novelist Thomas Hardy represented a few of
the major early modernists writing in England during the Victorian period.
The first decades of the 20th century saw several major works of modernism publi
shed, including the seminal short story collection Dubliners
by James Joyce, Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, and the poetry and drama of
William Butler Yeats. Joyce's magnum opus Ulysses, is
arguably the most important work of Modernist literature, and has been referred
to as "a demonstration and summation of the entire
movement".[6] It is an interpretation of the Odyssey set in Dublin, and culmina
tes in Finnegans Wake.

Virginia Woolf
Important novelists between the World Wars included Virginia Woolf, E. M. Forste
r, Evelyn Waugh, P.G. Wodehouse and D. H. Lawrence.
Woolf was an influential feminist, and a major stylistic innovator associated w
ith the stream-of-consciousness technique. Her 1929 novel
A Room of One's Own contains her famous dictum; "A woman must have money and a r
oom of her own if she is to write fiction".[7]
T. S. Eliot was the preeminent English poet of the period. Across the Atlantic
writers like William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, and the poets
Wallace Stevens and Robert Frost developed a more American take on the modernis
t aesthetic in their work.
Important in the development of the modernist movement was the American poet Ezr
a Pound. Credited with "discovering" both T. S. Eliot
and James Joyce, Pound also advanced the cause of imagism and free verse. Gertru
de Stein, an American expat, was also an enormous
literary force during this time period, famous for her line "Rose is a rose is a
 rose is a rose."
Other notable writers of this period included H.D., Marianne Moore, Elizabeth Bi
shop, W. H. Auden, Vladimir Nabokov, William Carlos Williams,
Ralph Ellison, Dylan Thomas, R.S. Thomas and Graham Greene. However, some of th
ese writers are more closely associated with what has
become known as post-modernism, a term often used to encompass the diverse rang
e of writers who succeeded the modernists.
[edit]Post-modern literature
Main article: Postmodern literature
The term Postmodern literature is used to describe certain tendencies in post-Wo
rld War II literature. It is both a continuation of the
experimentation championed by writers of the modernist period (relying heavily,
for example, on fragmentation, paradox, questionable
narrators, etc.) and a reaction against Enlightenment ideas implicit in Modernis
t literature. Postmodern literature, like postmodernism as
a whole, is difficult to define and there is little agreement on the exact chara
cteristics, scope, and importance of postmodern literature.
Henry Miller, William S. Burroughs, Joseph Heller, Kurt Vonnegut, Hunter S. Thom
pson, Truman Capote, Thomas Pynchon.
[edit]Post World War II

George Orwell
One of the most significant writers in this period was George Orwell. An essayis
t and novelist, Orwell's works are considered among the most
important social and political commentaries of the 20th century. Dealing with i
ssues such as poverty in The Road to Wigan Pier and Down and
Out in Paris and London, totalitarianism in Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Far
m, and colonialism in Burmese Days. Orwell's works were
often semi-autobiographical and in the case of Homage to Catalonia, wholly. Mal
colm Lowry is best known for Under the Volcano
Agatha Christie was a crime writer of novels, short stories and plays, best reme
mbered for her 80 detective novels and her successful West
End theatre plays. Christie's works, particularly featuring the detectives Herc
ule Poirot or Miss Marple, have given her the title the 'Queen of
Crime' and made her one of the most important and innovative writers in the deve
lopment of the genre. Christie's novels include, Murder on
the Orient Express, Death on the Nile and And Then There Were None. Another popu
lar writer during the Golden Age of detective fiction was
Dorothy L. Sayers. The novelist Georgette Heyer created the historical romance
genre.

J. R. R. Tolkien
An informal literary discussion group associated with the English faculty at the
University of Oxford, were the "Inklings". Its leading members
were the major fantasy novelists; C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien. Lewis is kno
wn for his fiction, especially The Chronicles of Narnia, while
Tolkien is best known as the author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.
In thriller writing, Ian Fleming created the character James Bond 007 in January
1952, while on holiday at his Jamaican estate, Goldeneye.
Fleming chronicled Bond's adventures in twelve novels, including Casino Royale 1
953, Live and Let Die 1954, Dr. No 1958, Goldfinger 1959,
Thunderball 1961, and nine short story works. Anthony Burgess's dystopian novel
A Clockwork Orange 1962, displays the prevention of the
main character Alex's exercise of his free will through the use of a classical c
onditioning technique. Burgess creates a new speech in his novel
that is the teenage slang of the not-too-distant future. Roald Dahl rose to pro
minence with his children's fantasy novels, often inspired from
experiences from his childhood, that are notable for their often unexpected end
ings, and unsentimental, dark humour. Science fiction novelist
Arthur C. Clarke's 2001: A Space Odyssey, is based on his various short stories,
particularly The Sentinel. Some notable writers in the latter half
of the 20th century include Ayn Rand, Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams, J. G. Bal
lard, Philip Pullman, Neil Gaiman, Alan Moore, William Golding a
nd Salman Rushdie. Ian McEwan's Atonement 2001, refers to the process of forgivi
ng or pardoning a transgression, and alludes to the main
characters' search for atonement in interwar England. His 2005 novel Saturday, f
ollows an especially eventful day in the life of a successful
neurosurgeon. J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter fantasy series, is a collection of se
ven fantasy novels that chronicle the adventures of the
adolescent wizard.
[edit]